A blind ex-soldier has received a substantial compensation payment after it was found that he was the victim of harassment and inhumane treatment at the hands of his work colleagues. Andrew Bull was blinded during a bombing in Belfast at the age of 21 and later got a job at the Blaenau Gwent council in South Wales. It was here that the harassment began after Mr Bull failed to join in with a two day strike because he was off work ill. It has been found that the treatment he suffered for the next two years before he was made redundant was damaging to him psychologically and he suffered depression as a result. The harassment took the form of jokes and mocking remarks. His colleagues then began to exclude him from work outings and then management made him redundant after 25 years of service. The actual amount of compensation will be decided next month but a judge has said that it is likely to be substantial.

Three land banking companies have been fined £32 million by the FSA in compensation for unauthorised sales to UK consumers. The land collective was made up of James Kenneth Maynard, Countrywide Land Holdings and Plateau Development and Land. The three companies have now been ordered to pay the compensation and the companies have either been wound up or placed into liquidation. Bankruptcy orders have also been placed on Maynard. Despite the huge fine, the FSA have said that any customers who have lost money are unlikely to get it back as there seems to be no assets left to sell. The scam involved investment in plots of land across the country with promises that money would be made once the land got planning permission. However there was never any intention of applying for planning for the land and in any case they were unlikely to ever receive such permission due to the rural locations.

The Formula One team Force India has applied to the Formula One governing body, the FIA to look into the use of their intellectual property by rival, Team Lotus. It seems that the UK courts agreed that some parts of the Force India cars had been used on their rivals car in 2010. The company behind the Team Lotus car had previously worked on the Force India car and used some of the same parts. It has been asked to pay compensation of 25,000 Euros by the courts and this ruling has led Force India into looking into whether there has been a breach of intellectual property rules according to the FIA. Force India have said that there is an Italian court case still under way to settle the matter, while the opposing team have said that they admitted they used some of the same parts in their car but that it was a mistake.

The family of a man with mental health problems who died when he jumped from a sixth floor window of the hospital he was staying in have won a compensation claim at the European Court of Human Rights. In a ground-breaking ruling the court agreed that the family of David Reynolds had been denied an effective remedy by the UK court system. Mr Reynolds had smashed the window, soon after his admission to the ward in a Halifax hospital. Despite having described voices which told him to kill himself, the coroner decided an open verdict on his death was appropriate and that the hospital staff were not to blame. However his family felt this was wrong and went to the European court after it was discovered they had no right of appeal for her compensation claim. They were told they had to prove negligence and that they could not make a claim based on his pain and suffering as he died instantly. They have now been awarded 7,000 in Euros and another 8,000 Euros has been charged to the UK government for legal costs.